Month: April 2015

I started this blog nearly two years ago – the third venture of trying to contribute to the efforts of those who seek to create a positive naturist spin on the world wide web. If you found my blog, you are probably well aware of the wide variety of webpages floating in cyberspace that fall a bit short of promoting family naturist ideals. And some of those hosted by “genuine naturists” (a label that invites controversy at best, I know!) run long on stories about coming out to naturism, but frequently run a bit shallow in providing resources that go beyond the ubiquitous questions and strategies for dealing with male arousal and those pesky rules about always carrying a towel.

One of my previous internet endeavors was focused on creating a network where naturist families could find one another; maybe even arrange a meet-up at a local naturist venue so our kids would know that naturism in America really is a normal, everyday kind of thing. That was a huge project, and a friend and I developed quite an involved screening process in an effort to identify people who were really looking for what we had on offer. But alas, the project produced at least anecdotal evidence that, in fact, naturism is not a normal everyday thing in the US. Sure, there are a few clubs scattered around the county that seem to have a nice family vibe going, but we were seeking something that felt like the family naturism scene we had experienced in Europe. That forum still exists today, (NFN) but after a couple years of getting up early each morning to screen a wide array of peculiar inquiries and sketchy applications, I passed the keys to naturist friends who had a bit more time and patience than I.

But I’m evading the topic implied in the title of this very post – the preponderance of butts on my blog!

As the days are getting longer, and I’m spending more time each week dreaming about where our next naked adventure might be, I’ve become nostalgic about all the places we’ve been. We – my wife and I – have been fortunate to share the love of travel, and have had enough resources over the years to bounce around the globe a good bit. After cruising through a few websites about places to get naked in Greece, or Hawaii, or Brazil, I suddenly felt the urge to change over the screen saver to our naturist travel folder. A chronicle that has become hugely symbolic in our married life as our shared passion for adventure without tan lines has, in many ways, defines our relationship.

If you’ve spent time on my blog, you have probably perused a few of our photo galleries, or read some of our location reports with photos that may well suggest that we’re camera shy when it comes to frontal nudity. But alas, that’s not really the case. Naturist photography has been a great hobby, and we will continue to document the realities of aging, if only for use on this blog – at least until Microsoft invents butt recognition software! Needless to say, we have been reticent to publish any photo that would provide positive ID to an acquaintance who might stumble into our site.

Before I go on, it’s worth noting that most of our family and friends know about our naturist tendencies, and our children – now adults – have been and continue to be willing participants. And, in fact, I tried for some time to rationalize that the hang up with frontal nudity (or for that matter, the very idea of naturism itself), was simply an American condition, founded in the mores of our prudish forefathers who arrived swaddled in Victorian clothing on the Mayflower.

The irony of all this is that the internet has created a resource for promoting naturism that would have been unimaginable 25 years ago when we were trying to find a naturist resort in France. But ironically enough, it has also become a cornerstone in the demise of naturism for those who fear retribution for their desires to bare all before God and high tech cell phones! One false move, and you’re tagged on social media, where anyone with a lack of understanding of the naturist phenomenon, let alone someone with vindictive tendencies, and you’re out there on a skewer; the subject of conjecture and accusation of deviant behavior. Walking naked on the beach? Is that really deviant behavior?

But(t) back to my point. About a year ago, I posed the question on a well moderated website dedicated to British naturism. Something to the effect of, “If you have a position of employment with a high public profile, how forthcoming are you about your naturist tendencies?” I was taken aback by the responses. While a few hardliners said, “If you don’t own up to it and come out full frontal – at least in a metaphorical sort of way – you’re doing naturism a disservice.”

But many more weighed in with a sense of gravitas, stating documented examples of those who have stepped forward to be counted amongst the naked and the proud, only to suffer serious repercussions, in some cases involving severe complications related to matters of employment.

Personally, we (my wife and I) believe there is nothing more beautiful, or real, than the human form. Apparently the artists and sculptors in Renaissance Italy felt much the same way, before the days of adulation of protruding pelvic bones and neatly defined abs. But until your photograph can be tagged by the curvature of your gluteus maximus, we will limit our web exposure to the past tense – the person who just walked by.

Would it be too punny to say, What a bummer!

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Like many bloggers, my inspiration to write – not to mention the time to think about writing – moves in cycles. Turns out that maintaining a blog can be a lot of work. If you’re lucky to have a few followers, they begin to wonder. Did you fall off the face of the earth? Run off and join a textile community? What happened? Where did you go? But now the days are getting longer, and we’re starting to make plans for the summer’s naturist adventures. Though there are still many tales to tell from our previous journeys; getting naked in Africa, exploring the Ionian islands of Greece, and finally making it to a remote little resort near the southern tip of the Yucatan peninsula. And I have yet to complete my list of 100 Naked Places. With this post, I hope to return to the ranks of active bloggers. Our next naturist travels are still a ways off in the distance, but the best way to live the future is to reminisce a bit about the past. Best wishes to you all for happy naturist travels in the coming months. If you’re new to this site, I hope you’ll take time to dig around for a while to read about some of our previous naturist adventures, along with a few opinion pieces intended to promote positive naturist ideals! Hopefully I’ll be a little more regular in posting about our naturist dreams – past, present, and future.